moon - dreamer's inc.

Finally, by the third ring, you managed to grip it and drag it to your ear.  “Hello?”  your voice was thick and gravel-like, coming out in a deep murmur you were hardly able to register yourself.

“Hello, are we reaching,” the voice on the other side came out clear and feminine, despite the underlying tiredness that went under your own radar.  She paused momentarily, before saying your name with a questioning tone.

“Yes…?  Who is this?”  whether it be the professionalism shown by the woman or the alarm of being awoken in the dead of night by someone who knew your name.

“Fantastic, this is Derry Home Hospital and we’re reaching you on account of Henry Bowers signing you as his emergency contact.”

“Huh?”

“Would...would you like me to repeat that?”

“No -- no, I’ll be down there as quickly as possible, thank you for calling.”

“Alright, thank you for your cooperation, and see you soon,” with that the woman was gone, leaving you to quickly ruminate over what the hell Henry had done.

Your history with him wasn’t exactly tidy, having gone through an on-again off-again relationship throughout highschool, mostly being left by him due to your ‘overly emotional’ nature.  However, these were mostly after arguments and fights initiated by him for petty reasons.  Eventually, after you’d graduated and found yourself on that mid-June morning, all contact with him had been reduced to some times you’d saw him in public.  You’d cast a gaze his way, then quickly do anything and everything in your power to either appear busy or disappear completely.

Groaning, you dragged yourself from bed, and did your best to work with getting ready in a timely fashion.  Truth be told, you honestly did not want to come face-to-face with the guy you’d been successfully avoiding for the past month.  But, when fate came ringing on your phone, what were you able to do?  Sighing through your nose, in the haze of a rude awakening, you pulled on the most comfortable but presentable clothing you could find, inclusive of a flannel, tank top, and pair of sweatpants.  Considering the shape these people had seen in the past, they could bear to see your tired eyes and laziness.

Before heading out the door, you briefly brushed your teeth, grabbed a water bottle, your keys, and wallet containing identification.  Though you hadn’t glanced at any clocks, you could deduce that it was the early morning, just before the sun was getting ready to come over the horizon.  Dark and starless.

The drive wasn’t exactly unpleasant, but you couldn’t really call it a tranquil drive, either.  What had Henry wound up doing?  Why was he in the hospital?  Was he gravely injured?  Where the fuck were his friends?  Even if it had felt like a wash of panic was coming over you, it was undeniably far less intense then the first two times you’d been called as his emergency contact.  Whatever the reason, he kept putting you down, practically claiming you as the most important and safest person in his life.

Fellow headlights were few and far between on the road, streetlights illuminating further then what your own car was doing for you.  Eventually, the fluorescent lighting of the hospital came into view, attracting you like an unfortunate moth to it.

Pulling into a space, you sighed in preparation of the worst.  The last two times you’d been there for him, he had been drugged up and nearly impossible to understand.  No matter what he looked like, you just hoped that he was going to be a tolerable presence.  With that thought, you headed into the main doors to reception.

“Hello,” you greeted, timid and taking a brief moment to hear your voice bounce against the walls and let your voice register.  “I, uh, was called as an emergency contact for my friend?”

“Oh, yes, are you here for Mr. Bowers?”  as she spoke, you registered her voice to be that of the nurse on the other side.

“Yeah! Yeah, that’s me.”

“His room number is number forty-four, I’ll show you to it,” she said, getting up and showing you down the pristine and sterile hallways.  On the way there, you take note of the few turns and landmarks that may need to navigate later.  She stepped into another room, one meant to house multiple patients, but with all but one bed empty.  “Here you are, another nurse will be seeing you shortly for his discharge.”

You padded further into the room, getting a good look at your peer laying on the bed, appearing to be fast asleep.  “Henry?”  You called out to him, the volume a bit of a strain against the tiredness practically coating your entire mind.

He awoke with a jolt, head jerking over to you with a scowl before softening slightly.  “Oh. S’just you,”  through the initial distaste you could feel a faint sense of relief from him.

“Yeah, just me,”  you took a seat at his bedside.  “What’d you do?”

“Right out the gate with the questions, huh?”

“Yep.  Now what’d you do, Hen?”

“Broke my foot ‘n dislocated a shoulder.  It was a fuckin’ blur how it all happened, so I don’t really remember all the fine details….my friends left me here, though.”

“Don’t they always,” you mumbled, taking a second to glance down at your phone and allowed your thoughts to flow into your focus. 4:22 a.m.  It was likely you wouldn’t be able to get back to bed.  Should you call in, allow yourself to take a day off?  Or should you rely on the power of caffeine and power through it?

“What happened t’us?”  his voice cut through the ebb and flow of the silence, the sound alone startling you into the present.

“Huh?”

“It’s like we saw each other every day then jus’ -- stopped,” his brows knit together as you looked to him, confusion blooming on each of your features, but with different origins.

“I don’t...I don’t know?”

“Neither do I...I miss it.  I miss you ‘n the way or you made me feel,” his face contorted further, like he was trying to solve a complicated math problem.  You shifted in your seat awkwardly and casted your gaze anywhere but him once again.

“I...I guess we just sorta fell off, Hen--”

“Don’t use that fuckin’ nickname with me,” he snapped, looking to you with a sudden harsh tone.  “S’been, what?  Two months since you spoke to me, four since y’last took the time to look at me?”

You sank into the depths of your seat when his ire-filled gaze turned to you.  Whatever words you had to say to him had long since died within your throat, not that any of them came with any type of maliciousness.  If you were able to be honest with yourself, you were somewhat surprised he hadn’t taken a more direct action to garner your attention in the months prior, and had instead taken the route to laying whatever you two had to an incomplete, and admittedly unsatisfactory, end.

“I’m sorry,” you were hardly able to muster, instead taking to fiddling with the long sleeves of the flannel you had.  Was there always an accent of red on the otherwise grayscale plaid color scheme?

He scoffed, rotating his uninjured shoulder and shifting in his bed.  “All y’can say is a ‘sorry’?  Shit, dude, I’d’a thought’cha to have more fight in ya.”

In the back of your mind, the snark of you had recalled the time to account for the lack of so-called fight within.

You sighed outwardly, once again, and dragged a hand down your face.  “Do you have anywhere to stay tonight, Henry?”

“Psh, old man’ll kill me if I barge in at fuck-all hours like this.”  No work today afterall.

“You wanna stay at my place?  You can take my bed.”

“Really?  Y’think I’m finally good enough to take a place in your bed, princess?”

“Careful,” you snap back, voice having taken on a sudden warning to its tone. “You sound like Hockstetter.  Don’t let his weird shit get to your head, Henry.”

“Oh, so you suddenly give a fuck about me ‘n who influences me, huh?  Fuck you think you are, my parent?”

“No, I just--”  You were cut off by a nurse stepping into the room.

“Mr. Bowers?”  He started, looking between the two of you with an air of caution.  “You’re free to go, just stop by the desk on your way out.  Would you like help getting into your wheelchair?”

“No,” he nearly barked back and shifted to move from the bed.

“Thank you,” you said quickly, getting up to help your friend from the bed when the nurse awkwardly shuffled from the room.  You didn’t scold your friend, even if how Henry had treated the nurse didn’t sit particularly well with you, the thought of another argument seemed to be on the horizon if you did.

He practically flung himself into the wheelchair with a grunt, pointing impatiently at the boot at the foot of his bed. “Don’t forget about my boot.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” you had said, voice truly devoid of any emotion whilst you grabbed your things to make a quick departure.  The quicker you could get home, the quicker you’d be able to fall back into sleep.

The discharging process proved itself less strenuous then you feared, only really consisting of yourself zoning out and Henry writing down his address - albeit, with the caveat of anything especially legible due to his dominant hand being injured.  At his prompting, and being drug involuntarily into reality once again, you wheeled him to your car and watched him struggle into the passenger seat.  You knew better then to offer help when he only wanted to keep up his ‘tough man’ act.  Silently, you put the wheelchair away and rushed back to your car.

It felt like the times when you were in a relationship with him all over again, something that settled uncomfortably onto your shoulders once you sat down in the driver’s seat and buckled your seatbelt.  “Buckle in,” you said, while starting to back out.

“Fuck off,” he snapped back.  You started driving in silence once again.

Both hands on the wheel.  The radio was drowned out by the engine.  You could nearly call it romantic had it been any situation when the two of you were infatuated with one another.  Running away and eloping under the moonlight, like you’d babbled about a few nights at the peak of your heart swelling for him.  Meaningless and empty words and fantasies of helping him from the predicament that was Derry.  It wrenched your heart, really, when you first met him.  Just a broken guy who maybe you could help out in some ways.  Maybe it was selfish of you.  Whatever.

The air felt stale and uncomfortable on the drive back, and it felt like an eternity before you pulled back into your driveway.  You glanced at the clock in your car. 5:00 a.m.  The sun was beginning to awaken, dusk starting to take ahold of the sky.

“How the hell am I gonna get you inside,” you murmured when you looked over to Henry, who stared blankly back at you.

“I’unno how well crutches would work since my shoulder ‘n all...Jus’ fuckin’ uh...help me to the door ‘n we’ll figure it out from there?  Y’still got that office chair, right?”

You nodded, opening the door and getting out.  You strolled up the pathway to your own door before going back to help the boy out of the car.  It was entirely too awkward, the way he threw an arm around you and leaned nearly all his weight on you.  The way you put an arm around your waist.  It brought back the past in the oddest way possible.  God, you wanted this to be over more than anything.

Many grunts and swears and a chair ride through hardwood floored rooms later, Henry laid in your bed and the front door went back to its closed and locked default.  If you had the energy in you, you would’ve sneered at the very idea of Henry fucking Bowers in your bed sullying your newly washed sheets.  Though, you could only stare for a few moments before beginning to gather things to sleep on your couch.

“Why?”  you asked as he stared at the ceiling.

“Why what?”

“Why do you keep putting me down as your emergency contact?  Don’t your friends know how to do that shit?”

“They’re scared.”

“Of what?”

“Bein’ fuckin’ adults’r somethin’, you done with the damn questions?”

“Yep.  See’ya, sleep well.”